Will Detroit Be The First Major Chinese City In The United States?

Is Detroit destined to become a Chinese city? Chinese homebuyers and Chinese businesses are starting to flood into the Motor City, and the governor of Michigan is greatly encouraging this. In fact, he has formally asked the Obama administration for 50,000 special federal immigration visas to encourage even more immigration from China and elsewhere. So will Detroit be the first major city in the United States to be dominated by China? It could happen. Once upon a time, Detroit was the greatest manufacturing city in the history of the world and it had the highest per capita income in the entire country. But now it is a rotting, decaying, bankrupt hellhole that is in desperate need of a savior, and Michigan Governor Rick Snyder appears to be fully convinced that China can be that savior.

To Snyder, encouraging foreigners to invest money and buy up properties won't cost the state government much, but it could potentially have great benefits...

Under a plan to be unveiled Thursday, Gov. Rick Snyder will request 50,000 special federal immigration visas over the next five years to attract foreign professionals who are willing to work and live in the city.

Mr. Snyder, in an interview Wednesday, said that “this is one way for the federal government to step up to provide significant value without cost that could have a huge impact on the city’s future.”

"Let's send a message to the entire world: Detroit, Michigan, is open to the world."

In other words, Snyder wants China to save Detroit since nobody in this country is going to.

Snyder has also taken a couple of additional steps to encourage immigration and foreign investment, including opening up something called "an Office for New Americans"...

Opening an Office for New Americans to attract and help immigrants better adjust to life in Michigan, and designating the state as an Employer Based or EB-5 center to expedite visas and permits for immigrants who want to open business in the state with investments of at least $500,000 and 10 employees.

In essence, Snyder has done just about everything except roll out the welcome mat for the Chinese.

But this is nothing new for Governor Snyder. In fact, he has been making overtures to China for years...

Snyder, who was a businessman before starting his political career, believes that automobiles can no longer change the fate of Detroit. He said that he has learned from the history of the United States that what has made the nation great is immigrants.

In the early 1990s, Snyder went to China to develop the automobile market. After he was elected as the governor of Michigan, he made at least one trip to China every year, with the aim of recruiting talent.

He hopes that well-educated Chinese people can revitalize the Motor City in the new era. And as he desired, after Detroit announced its bankruptcy in 2013, the Chinese began to take the dying city by storm.

Rich Chinese men see Detroit as a rare opportunity for investment outside their home country.

In 2013, without any field investigation, Dongdu International Group of Shanghai — whose assets total 5 billion yuan (US$800 million) — spent US$13.6 million to buy the David Stott building and the Detroit Free Press building at auctions in September.

And when we talk about the Chinese domination of Detroit, this is not something that is just future tense. This is something that is already happening right now. For example, the following is an excerpt from a CNBC article that discussed how Chinese companies are already aggressively "putting down roots in Detroit"…

Dozens of companies from China are putting down roots in Detroit, part of the country’s steady push into the American auto industry.

Chinese-owned companies are investing in American businesses and new vehicle technology, selling everything from seat belts to shock absorbers in retail stores, and hiring experienced engineers and designers in an effort to soak up the talent and expertise of domestic automakers and their suppliers.

The transformation that has taken place in that region of the country is absolutely remarkable.

And now we are relying on China to come in and salvage the ruins of our gutted economic infrastructure.

Not only that, but the Chinese are also eagerly buying up homes at extremely depressed prices all over Detroit.

According to CNN, Detroit is already number four on the list of the top 10 destinations for Chinese homebuyers. In many cases, Chinese buyers are scooping up properties without even looking at them first. Just check out what one Detroit real estate broker told Quartz last July...

“I have people calling and saying, ‘I’m serious—I wanna buy 100, 200 properties,’” she tells Quartz, noting that one of her colleagues recently sold 30 properties to a Chinese buyer. “They say ‘We don’t need to see them. Just pick the good ones.’”

And they aren't just interested in Detroit. As I have written about previously, one Chinese company known as "Sino-Michigan Properties LLC" actually had plans to buy 200 acres of land near the little town of Milan, Michigan and turn it into a "China City" with artificial lakes, a Chinese cultural center and hundreds of housing units for Chinese citizens. For much more on how Chinese buyers are gobbling up real estate all over the nation, please see my previous article entitled "The Chinese Are Acquiring Large Chunks Of Land In Communities All Over America".

All of this is just another indication of how rapidly the global economic landscape is changing.

Since the late 19th Century, the United States has been the most dominant economic power in the world.

Someone who obviously does not live in the area or has even been to Southeast Michigan. There are far more Arabs in the Detroit area than Chinese - in fact, large scale Chinese populations in the Detroit area are non-existent. They are buying the properties here - not moving here.

Yeah, Detroit is rotting from within and it started with the shenagins of the late mayor of Detroit "It's my People Mover" Coleman Young. The problem perception-wise for the rest of the country is if you could core out the area from Downtown Detroit to the outlying suburbs you would find one of the nicest areas in the US (winters notwithstanding). This is coming from a resident of the area that has been to most of the other largest metro areas in the country.

So, first they gave the jobs to the Chinese, then they got surprised that the yanks couldn't afford to buy any land, so now they're selling the land to the Chinese. Well, I guess they worked hard and so deserve whatever they can afford to buy. Guess it will also cut shipping costs. Hey! Wasn't all this a little subplot in a Will Ferrel movie recently?http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7yC0iiK7a4

(The Campaign)

When you impoverish your citizens, make a foreign country rich, and then sell your land to a foreign country, isn't there a word that means all that?

No, not globalisation. The other word. Often associated with pieces of rope for offenders.

Bet the Chinese will be pissed and wish they had have bought sooner when they see all the wasted factories and infrastructure that they have to rebuild. Then again, if everything was working then they wouldn't be able to get it at bargain prices. They are getting it cheap, aren't they? Guess it doesn't matter. What else would they do with all them US dollars?

Just North of Detroit live more Muslims then in Iraq and Pakistan combined. A recent article said there are over 60,000 Muslims in that subrub. The second largest concentration is just east of San Diego [go figure?] where they said over 40,00 live.

So why not have the Chinese in Downtown Detroit? It all sounds like improvements to me from the previous bunch.

The Arabs in the Detroit area are some of the hardest working, smartest, business people I have ever encountered. If they had more say in the way the city was run Detroit would not be in the mess it is in.

amrka may have "hit peak government" but the global governing game is in full swing.

what about this story hasn't been obvious for years, hmm?

Snyder, who was a businessman before starting his political career. . .

In the early 1990s, Snyder went to China to develop the automobile market. After he was elected as the governor of Michigan, he made at least one trip to China every year, with the aim of recruiting talent.

dude's been on the global-bandwagon for over two decades, tell me this isn't a fuckin' pattern here, lol.

wake up folks, nationstates are artificial, arbitrary, IMAGINARY boundaries created in the minds of the flag-wavers, and kept alive via the stupid "voting games" - much like sports team colours & cheerleaders - the same distractions on a larger scale.

at the treaty of westphalia, they represented recognition of cultural and social groupings.

many of the worlds problems stem from colonialists creating boundries based on economic or bureuacratic usefulness at the expense of the cultures affected. today, globalists are continuing the tradition

Post-Mao strategy for global victory. Once an area is >51% Chinese, it has the power to hold a referendum and vote to become seperate or be annexed by China. Same as Crimea. Kosovo, et al, really opened a can of worms.

Unlike Aussies and Americans, the Chinese are perfectly happy living in what others consider "cramped" accommodation, and the new Migrants could (and most probably would) increase head-count fairly rapidly.

It would be interesting to see how many "family and friends" coming to visit had Chinese Military background (active or otherwise).

It might also be "interesting" to see what would happen if they "decided to stay a little longer" once their visas expired (seeing as the US owes China trillions) . . . . . .

Or maybe you're one of the "Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, Japanese, all the same gookery" type of person, in which case stop posting altogether and go back to eating some pork rinds with (domestic) beer with your heeeee-ah friends.

Canada did the top end immigration program in the ninties when the Chinese were taking Hong Kong back. Chinese business folks were freaking out, looking for a safe haven for all the cash they had looted from their business interests, the mainland, and plain old thievery.

Got a half million ? Congratulations, Hong Kong boy with money, you are now an official Canadian citizen. Hong Kong money ran to hide in Canada, similar to what is going on with Chinese expatriates in Detroit.

Back then, their favorite city was Vancouver. Well, they turned the gem of the Pacific into a high density high rise metropolis - similar to Hong Kong. I guess that there really is no place like home, until you build it out that way. Chinese money came over by the boat load, and now Chinese money owns Vancouver from asshole to appetite.

AVERAGE JOE CANADIAN CAN'T AFFORD TO RETIRE THERE NOW - REAL ESTATE PRICES ARE OUTTASITE. SAME THING WILL HAPPEN TO DETROIT, OTHER CITIES, INDUSTRIES, AND NATURAL RESOURCE SECTORS.

Make no mistake - you are dealing with a " look after the generations ahead ' dynasty mind set that plays to win. Commies couldn't do it, war couldn't do it, however, Chinese money will do it but good. Slowly but surely, Chinese money has been buying up assets here in North America for decades. They will win the economic war right here, right now.

This is no sudden dose of rats leaving the sinking ship, but the shakey economic picture in China today is creating another big wave of cash coming soon to control resources and assets here in Capitalist Land.

I don't give a fuck whether you are red, green, yellow, black, or want your fudge packed daily - do whatever you want. No skin off of my ass. It is a free country, live and let live. Canada has more cultural diversity in ten percent of the U.S. population by a factor of 100. So, fuck you and your hackneyed redneck rant.

And, wake the fuck up. These folks play to win.

So, in closing, in character with your suggestion for my recreational activity, I would like to suggest you go fuck yourself with that rechargeable dildo you plug in alongside of your Prius while watching Hope and Change Oblammie teleprompter speech re runs. See you on the freeway clogging up the passing lane at a steady 55 mph, brake checking all of the folks who want to travel at a sane rate of speed, you rainbow skittle shitting flying unicorn lib tard eco weenie.

You will be the first thing to hit the bar b q in your neighborhood when the shit hits the fan. And, I don't think you will taste like chicken - more like long pig.

Happening in NZ too, heard a couple on the main street in Auckland city who had just come off a cruise ship say "I could have sworn we're in Hong Kong" and you just have to look around to see exactly what they meant.

Essentially given their political and business involvement in this country and our polititians desire to suck up to them and their money, I see us now as NZ R.O.C. New Zeland Republic of China.

Indeed better start learning chinese. I've started with the swears and get great delight in showing my lingual prowess as I pass them in malls with greetings such as "Fuck you!" "Hope you die" "Go to hell" "Fuck your mother's smelly pussy" all in their native tongue so that they know I care enough to learn a few words to help them integrate, I mean get the fuck outta here.

My guess would be one of the new or prospective holders of a Detroit franchise of City Wok (pronounced shitty wok, of course, but you already knew that) or JKC (Just Killed Cat, Chinese citizenism fastfood restaurant having favorite famously).

Disengruntlement taken wontonly on implication dogs and cats the worthlessness.

"Unwanted" is a matter of perspective. Pigs are smarter than most people, yet you likely wouldn't object to an agricultural system that tortures them brutally prior to processing them for your consumption.

Wasn't MLK the one who plagarized his doctoral thesis and many of his speeches? The one who stole money from the South. Christian Leadership Conference so he could buy hookers? Wasn't he the one who consorted with known Jewish communists? Wasn't he the one who liked beating proStitutes and apparently whose only reason for wanting civil rights was so he could fuck white prostitutes? That MLK?

I suspect it is more likely the Chinese will learn English. Most Chinese only know a few hundred characters out of tens of thousands, and there are hundreds of regional dialects. They already use Latin/Arabic numerals, and you need English to fly an airplane.

Just totaly pathetic....sadder is most americans would probably think this is just swell. I run into this frequently with my folks, whatever they're talking about and their opinion of it is just what the media told them to think about it.

Finally someone with a well thoughtout comment that doesn't bash Detroit because it's an easy target and due to the fact they get their info about the city from the same MSM that lies to everyone on everything else every day. The rapid decay of the city really started with the NAFTA treaty and giving most favored nation status to China - which were nothing but treasonous actions IMHO.

Thanks to inane MSM news focusing on things like tornados in Oklahoma and one missing plane in the Pacific, most Americans are blissfully unaware of the playbook the Chinese have been (successfully) following in Africa.

There are entire regions that are effectively under Chinese control, all without a single shot fired, so that supplies of raw material have unfettered access to Chinese factories back home. Of course beachheads in the U.S. are for intellectual property rather than raw materials.

I think that there may be difficulties taking over Detroit. If they can take over whole blighted areas, one strategy might be to clear absolutely everything off of that area (to eliminate any kind of squatting) and once there is sufficient political control, the police force could be reinforced to deal with criminal problems.

I don't agree that Americans are short sighted or stupid, but there may certainly be individuals that are. I think that the loss of productive individuals to the suburbs and the subsequent loss of tax revenue plus city management problems have contributed greatly to the decline of Detroit. Even if city managers are fully aware of the potential effects of a chinese takeover, the managers may decide that a takeover is better than the current state of affairs.

It will be interesting to see if they can pull this off. It's not like the chinese are infalliable. A civilization that invented paper money should be concerned about ideas that seemed like a good idea at the time.

Fuck it. Why don't we fly in some of those Andamar Islanders while we're at it? You know, those poor fuckers that don't even have fire unless lightening makes it for them. They'll think it's a veritable paradise.

We think this is a good deal, also for the stock market. As a reminder,we see the S&P500 at 2400 by year end. On a stock basis, we recommend AAPL with a price target of 2000 by 2019 and NFLX touching 1800 by 2016.

Do you think those gangs will be tolerated? No. And that's the thing, now, in order to please their new Chinese 'investors', Michigan WILL start spending all that money they claimed they didn't have when there were just poor Americans living there. I hope the taxpayers who felt so smug about 'cutting the deadbeats off' remember that when their taxes go up anyway, to make things 'nice' for a bunch of foreigners.

Detroit is an exciting opportunity. The architectural developments of the post industrial age will be forged in the crucible of what "zerohedge neophytes" consider a "burned out hellscape". No Detroit is exciting and the process of transforming a dense urban landscape into a sustainable agricultural and technological hubzone is underway. Get in on the ground floor while you can still buy a home in Detroit for under $100K, I made a smoking deal to buy my Detroit home for $1.00 with the caveat that I pay taxes at the preexisting value, this is a smoking deal and if you can get one, it's a screaming buy.

Detroit is an exciting opportunity. The architectural developments of the post industrial age will be forged in the crucible of what "zerohedge neophytes" consider a "burned out hellscape". . . . . . .

The ratio of the number of up to down arrows to your post reflects the readers'/posters general ignorance pertaining to the issues you raise. Urban agribusiness has already started in some of the previously "burned out" areas of the city and there is a concerted effort on the part of small/medium sized business to diversify into new technologies not related to the auto industry such as alternative energy related manufacturing.

Indeed Seoul brother, an interesting 9 down to 5 up ratio at this time. ZH readerhsip does skew a bit bucktooth racist / ignorant. What thay fail to see is that my modest proposal for urban agribusiness is aligned with their stated goals of self-sufficiency. THough no doubt the 9 down votes eat fast frozen and homogenized slop that it deprived of any real nutrient value. My Detroit is an aquculture mecca with neighborhood catfish fries and fresh greens every night. Won't you be my neighbor?